Runoff

If you are a registered voter in H-Town City Council District C, don’t bother voting in the May runoff. The race is over and progressives won, according to Evan Mintz who runs the Chron E-Board. Here is how Mintz’s latest take starts:
Don’t be fooled by the fact that the race is going to a runoff — Saturday’s special election for City Council District C was a blowout. Houston progressives were the winner.

Yes, voters will be returning for a showdown between Joe Panzarella, a community organizer who led with 33.3% of the vote, and Nick Hellyar, a longtime City Hall staffer who had 22.5%. But there were seven candidates in the race and Hellyar was basically the only serious contender running as anything but a proud progressive. That should’ve allowed Hellyar to consolidate the non-progressive vote and emerge as a clear frontrunner while others divided the left-leaning pie six ways.

That didn’t happen — and it should have Houston politicos paying attention. 

Here is the entire Mintz read: What Houston’s District C race reveals about local politics.

Here is what Charles Kuffner has to say about what Mintz put out. See this:

District C did indeed go strongly for Mayor Whitmire in 2023, both in November and December. I’d venture that the special election is a reflection of the disenchantment that a significant portion of the District C electorate feels about the Mayor and his local policies at least as much as it is about Donald Trump, but I will agree that there’s a connection between the two. There are definitely people in District C who approve of the changes made to the Montrose Blvd redesign, and who would love to see the West 11th bike lane taken out, but they were greatly outnumbered, both in the candidate lineup and in the vote.

I’m a little surprised that Evan didn’t mention the Alejandra Salinas victory in the At Large #4 runoff, which was also by a substantial margin, as a precursor to this. CM Salinas criticized Mayor Whitmire for his belated admission about HPD’s cooperation with ICE, and is now leading the charge to codify some limits on it. I do think, as Evan suggests, that the way this vote goes will tell us something about what to expect in 2027, especially from Democratic Council members who will be on the ballot that year, as well as the Mayor himself. I’ll be watching for that.

Anyway. Whatever the case with this election, there’s still a runoff for Panzarella to win for any of this to matter. Turnout will be low, because that’s the nature of runoffs, but maybe not much lower than this election because now the choice is clearer than it was in the seven-candidate field and we’re likely to see a bit more aggression in the campaigns. Get ready to vote again, District C.

Here is all of Off the Kuff: Was the District C special election an inflection point? | Off the Kuff.

Here is the deal. It is a runoff and folks still have to cast a ballot. Trust me.

I am not a progressive, so I guess I didn’t win. I prefer to identify as a liberal. I will get my mail ballot in a couple of weeks and vote for Nick. I will keep my yard sign in the featured photo in my yard. I will wait for the lady to sing and not take my campaign orders from the Chron E-Board.

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Commentary was perusing the Chron hard copy sports section today and I ran across a new stat column. It is titled the “MLB ABS challenge results.” If you follow MLB this season, you should know about batters, catchers, and pitchers can now challenge called balls and strikes. Since you asked, through this past Sunday, the Tigers lead with 15 winning challenges and losing 5 for a 75% rate. The Guardians are at the bottom with 6 wins and 13 losses for a 32% rate. The Astros are 8-9 with a 47% success rate. Cool, if you like the new challenge system.

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We lost last night and sit at 6-5.